"Jerry Jones is the only person who can actually fix this and he also might be the only person who doesn't know it is broken."- 12/30/13
Daily Commentary on the Dallas Sports Scene - By Bob Sturm - Sportsradio 1310, The Ticket

Wednesday, October 27, 2010

I am not sure what sort of tone that "Decoding Garrett" is going to take for the next 6-8 weeks, but let's take it one game at a time. The Object of the two Decoding Garrett posts that appear normally on Tuesdays (this week Wednesdays) is to show you some things the offense is try to accomplish and evaluate whether it is working or not.

There wasn't a ton of good to look at from Monday Night, so this particular edition is going to analyze some of the negative.

5 plays this week, and hopefully starting next week we can see what they are hoping to do with Jon Kitna with a full week of preparation.

What Happened:We wonder how different this game would have potentially been if Austin makes this catch. We seldom see Miles Austin doing things of the negative variety, but Monday was not his best performance. When they say things happen more quickly in the red zone, this is what they mean. This is the only snap of S12 for the entire night. Bennett and Williams are on the right, Austin and Witten are on the left. The TE on each side runs a simple out pattern while Williams heads up the hash and Austin squares out at the goal-line. A very difficult throw and catch and the ball is on Austin before he is out of his break. The Giants are blitzing here, so Romo has to anticipate, and his default setting is to go to Miles because Austin has been so dependable. If Romo had made Williams his primary, he looks like he is wide open. But, Romo is dealing with a blitz and has to make a difficult throw. Close, but no cigar. And the Cowboys must settle for 3 points here after starting a possession at the Giants 18 after the Sensabaugh interception.

What Happened: Here in a nutshell is the Cowboys running game right now. They killed the Giants last season on "22" personnel, but those days are gone, it would appear. A very basic running play for the Cowboys with "22" (2 RB, 2 TE, 1 WR) where they go down, down, and around which means that LT, LG, and even C, are blocking down to their right, with Leonard Davis and the Fullback Gronkowski coming around the edge with Witten to get blocks in space and free the runner. As I can tell, Free, Gronkowski, and Witten have very little success, but Leonard Davis must get 53-Kevin Bullock when he comes around the corner. Davis has had a rough year and people are starting to talk about his diminishing skills. This play won't help that chatter because he doesn't even come close to getting Bullock. Davis dives on to the ground, and Bullock destroys the play. And as you can see, when Davis misses, then Witten has no chance at blocking 3 guys and it is a 0 yard gain on 1st down. Demoralizing but true.

What Happened: OK, since you have seen this play 100 times already, I just want to discuss the idea of the check/release responsibility of Gronkowski on this play. Check/release means that his first job is to check the blitz, and if there is none to pick up, he releases into the flat to become a target for Romo. I assume that 59-Michael Boley dummied him and delayed his blitz before coming, but when you look at the replays, it appears that Boley did not really delay his blitz much at all. Gronkowski must decide if Boley is coming, and he obviously diagnoses the SAM LB as a coverage LB and gets it dead wrong. This happens all of the time in the NFL, and this is why many coaches hate to depend on rookies in the back field to get these diagnose plays right all of the time. Gronkowski appears to be in a hurry to get to the flat to make himself a target. Most coaches would remind him that his target in the flat will be Romo's last option, so be safe and just stay in and protect even if there is a small amount of doubt. He gets this dead wrong and while 95% of the time if you get your QB hit he gets up, this was not the case here. Chris Gronkowski may have a bright future in this league, but unfortunately, right now he is known as the guy who got Romo hurt.

What Happened: This is the Cowboys only successful run play for the week, and really, the only successful run play going back to the Tennessee game. "12" personnel, and with only a little over a minute to play in the half, you could assume that the Giants might be assuming a pass play here. Regardless, this does show Felix's ability to bounce things outside and make a few guys miss. The one miss that is key is 34-Deon Grant who flies in like a missile to hit Jones behind the line of scrimmage, but Jones makes him miss easily and gets 17 yards to the edge before he is body slammed by 24-Thomas. It is a weakside run with Montrae Holland pushing his man well downfield. The burst of speed is the key here, so you do wonder if Barber would have been able to get 4 yards on this play.

What Happened: And now, the final offensive snap of the game, and what this is a demonstration of the ability of Dez Bryant to slash through a secondary with his burst. As I mentioned in the "Data" post, Kitna completed all of his throws like this (shallow and inside the numbers) so it will be up to him to show the opponents that they must respect the whole field, otherwise things are going to get more congested in that high traffic area and his targets will become more difficult to hit. But, on this 4th down, Dez, is on the same side as Austin who clears out the safety and now Bryant can work past 23-Corey Webster and then hit the gas and he is gone. Kitna doing a nice job hitting his hot route in stride and this is some level of promise for next week. They assure us this is not another Brad Johnson situation, and I tend to believe them. But, it will depend on him showing that he can throw the ball to the flanks from time to time to keep the coverages honest.

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Tomorrow: Targets and Sacks for Week 6

Bob Sturm is host of BaD Radio on The Ticket 1310 AM Mondays through Fridays at 12-3 p.m. He also hosts The Ticket's Cowboys pregame show. Follow Bob on Twitter at www.twitter.com/bobanddan Bob offers his exclusive analysis after games on SportsDayDFW.com

2 comments:

The blitz, especially the delayed blitz, seems to kill the Cowboys, no matter who the OL is. If it was one particular player I could understand, but the fact that even our FB got involved in this fiasco leading to Romo being injured, leads me to believe that it is beyond an 'ability' issue. Old shouldn't be an issue in reading what is coming, in fact, experience should help, unless of course old has led to senility.

I don't know if it is Romo checking down on the blitz or that teams disguise it well, or our OL is just plain dumb.

Maybe you can do a break-down on certain plays in each game where we just fail on the delayed blitz.

I think that Kitna may bring some good after all. If we can effectively exploit defenses with these slants and ins, and we should because of our WR talent, it should become a much added benefit to Romo, when he returns.

It may be a good way to open up the deep passing game, since our running game is crap right now.